1. Field of the Invention:
An agricultural sprayer is driven through the use of a tractor hydraulic system. More specifically the tractor hydraulic system flow is directed to a rotary flow divider having one rotor acting as a motor while a smaller volume rotor acts as a pump to drive a motor for driving a liquid distribution pump.
2. Description of the Prior Art:
The agricultural practices of modern farmers involve the utilization of many sprayer applied liquid products such as insecticides, weed controls, defoliants and fertilizers. These products are often sprayed onto the ground or onto living plants to effect the desired result. An efficient system to apply the various liquids is through pressurized distribution nozzles and manifolds. The liquid manifold is fed through a pump in the supply line from the storage tank carried on the sprayer implement frame. The pump to generate flow of the liquids is oftentimes a centrifugal impeller pump.
The centrifugal pump is usually driven by a hydraulic motor that receives fluid from hydraulic systems of the host tractor in situations where a tractor pulled sprayer is being used. The hydraulic horsepower needed to drive most of the motor driven centrifugal pumps in use today is four or five horsepower, while the hydraulic horsepower of the auxiliary hydraulic supply of tractors is in the twenty or more horsepower neighborhood. Typically, the host tractors are at least midsize vehicles and range upward to very large vehicles for spraying operations.
Since the tractor hydraulic systems will be delivering about four times the required fluid flow at the pressure required to drive the pump drive motor a large percentage of the fluid has to be bypassed over relief without doing any useful work. Of course this is a substantial energy loss usually generating a considerable undesirable temperature rise in the hydraulic fluid and wasting horsepower.
Although other spraying systems are available the inventor knows of no systems where the host tractor hydraulics are used to drive a motor to drive the liquid pressurizing pump after the flow from the tractor hydraulic system is passed through a rotary flow divider.
Rotary flow dividers per se are known but have not been used in useful applications in the agricultural industry.